Dimensional Design Project (Work In Progress)

The design screened onto canvas

My screen printing setup consists of a light taped
 to the toilet paper holder in my bathroom.

Design exposed into the screen. Also pictured: my girlfriend's cat being a creep.

This was an assignment for my dimensional design class. We had to make a bag for the Fourth of July. We were free to employ our own concept and being that the holiday isn’t so much an environmentally friendly one I wanted to address that in my concept, that being to bring a message to encourage people to “Have a green fourth of July”.

Needless to say I ran into problems getting parts of the design to come through clearly, I think the ink i mixed has either been to thick or too thin, blotting up or not printing as crisp as I would have wanted but I intend to revise this before the quarter is over and have images up of the complete bag as well.

Visit my tumblr for other art related things: redntoothnclaw.tumblr.com/

Hintergrund - Nemesis Digital Release

Album Cover

I'm happy to say that the new Hintergrund album, 'Nemesis', our second release is finished and is now available for free to stream and download. I'd like to say a few things regarding details about the albums production and completion.

What we were able to accomplish with 'Nemesis' encompasses a much more expansive sonic range than our previous effort, Signal Blister. The sounds range from crushing walls of dense distortion and feedback, to screeching oscillation, to airy and colorful ambience. One of the beautiful things about noise and the likes of experimental music is the process, which many times is a wholly improvised matter that always leaves room for the possibility of failure and spontaneity, an aspect that is unfortunately all too often alien to music. In noise this additional element played a large role in how the album was created. We worked with what we had at the time; a broken guitar, an old broken karaoke microphone, prepared saxophone, circuit bent electronics, and whatever else we could find that we felt was worth recording. Much like the sound of 'Nemesis' the instrumentation directly reflects this brokenness. I think it is safe to say that, for me at least that 'Nemesis' is not only to be heard as a piece of music but to be seen as being representative of an exercise in experimentation, our instruments not simply being used as they were intended to be but rather used as an extension of our collective ideas, improvised and elaborated on in that moment.

From this point on I will be focusing on putting together the artwork for a physical release of the album. You can stream and download 'Nemesis' at the links provided below. Enjoy.

Download Nemesis Here

Also, Brian recently finished his latest solo effort under the name Glasslung entitled 'New Martyrs'. You can download and stream that here: Sleeping Glass.

Links:

Nemesis on Last.fm

Brian Sopher on Soundcloud

Tyler Thompson on Soundcloud

Moosick Records

Illustrations For New Hintergrund Album

Exterior Artwork

During the summer of last year my good friend Brian Sopher and I got together for a jam session in which we spent time making noises, drones, and generally experimenting. Out of these freeform jam sessions our experimentation evolved into what is now known as the drone / noise duo Hintergrund. We released our first album Signal Blister during the summer of last year. Sometime back in January nearing the end of my winter break away from school Brian and I got together once again to record with no specific goal in mind before departing back to our respective colleges. Early in the first weeks of summer we met up to finish what we had started and to say the least, having given multiple listens, I'm pretty pleased with the results. What we were able to achieve is much more diverse than what can be heard on our first full length, Signal Blister.

Interior Artwork

The artwork is nearing completion. The two images seen above, that of the interior and exterior spreads are complete. All that is necessary now is the addition of type and the application of color.

As I have stated in past posts I believe the artwork is a crucial part, perhaps even on an equal level as the music in which it accompanies. Sometimes the artwork can determine whether or not I actually purchase an album whereas I could simply download it for free. Not only is it important in that aspect but also reflectively. I believe the artwork should serve a purpose not separate from the music but rather compliment the music visually in a way that reflects the mood, the concept, and emotions derived from it. With that said the artwork I have begun working on can be looked at as my interpretation of the sounds on this album in a visual form; fragmented, disjointed, chaotic, and broken which needless to say are a few words that essentially summarize the music that Brian and I have created together sonically in a visual sense.

On Repeat: Pigeon Breeders - Luminous Debris, Teotl Expansion - P:1, Heccra - The Last Weekend of Summer, White Suns - Sinews

Choice Cinema: David Lynch - 'Mulholland Drive' and 'Blue Velvet'

Good Reads: Mark Z. Danielewski - 'House Of Leaves'

Blogs / Sites: The League of Movable Type, Fonts of Chaos

Screen Printing Hintergrund T-Shirts

So its been a minute since I've updated this blog.

Late last year I purchased a Speedball screen printing kit which due to time constraints from school work and a general lack of motivation (mostly the latter) I didn't bother messing around with. With all of the free time I had during the summer away from school I decided to set aside some time to learn about the process of screen printing.

The image I worked with is a photograph of an old factory tower I took that was used as artwork for the album sleeve of the first Hintergrund release, Signal Blister. I used the diazo photo emulsion technique to reproduce the image seeing as that is pretty much the only way of replicating it while retaining as much detail as possible. The process involved much trial and error as I often ended up with either an under exposed image or an over-exposed one but finally I was able to achieve a proper exposure.

I think the final image turned out nicely and have printed around 12 black on white t-shirts for the first run. If demand is high enough I may print more but until now this is it.

In other Hintergrund related news, during the summer Brian and I got together to record material for the next Hintergrund release, all post-production and mastering has been completed and having given multiple listens the results sound great. More details regarding the new album and a release date will be determined as soon as I finish completing the art work, which I will post the progress of here.

On Repeat: Wreck and Reference - 'No Youth', White Suns - 'Sinews', Bosse-de-Nage - 'III', Death Grips - 'No Love Deep Web'

Choice Cinema: Last Year At Marienbad, Symbiopsychotaxiplasm, Julien Donkey-Boy, Naked

Good Reads: Mark Danielewski - 'House Of Leaves, Miranda July' - 'No One Belongs Here More Than You', Jack Kerouac - 'On The Road', Alison Bechdel - 'Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic'

Hintergrund - Signal Blister Physical Release

Album Cover

Over the summer of 2011 friend and fellow musician Brian Sopher and I released a full length album entitled Signal Blister under the name Hintergrund consisting of improvised compositions created utilizing treated guitar, synth, a cheap broken microphone and plenty of digital processing. The music on the release is comprised of seven somewhat long droning compositions interlaced with traces of melody and rhythm all buried beneath layers of tectonic ever shifting walls of distortion and colorful textures.

Previously, I had written several blog posts including information as well as images and samples from the album. The album artwork is derived from a series of edited photographs of an abandoned factory I shot during the production of the album. One of my favorite aspects of purchasing a piece of music in a physical format, whether it be a CD or vinyl copy has been the artwork that accompanies it, something that gave me a reason to buy it as oppose to simply downloading a digital copy or pirating it. The artwork often times provides a deeper look into the music, sometimes exemplifying a more personal aspect of the music that wouldn't be present otherwise. I feel as though the artwork that accompanies the album does well in visually representing the sounds within the recordings, providing images to stimulate the listener; this idea of layers of paint and concrete having been removed, decayed, weathered, and worn away to reveal an underlying surface, much like the sounds on Signal Blister. The physical copies of the album were finished in October of last year and are handmade, therefore limited to only thirteen unnumbered copies, all of which will be given away to close friends and other desirables. Above is a cropped image of the album artwork and below is the physical release displaying the gatefold style packaging as well as the CD and sleeve. There is a link provided below to a free download of the album in 320 kbps which includes the artwork. Enjoy.

Thanks goes to Kyle Plaskon for photographing the album packaging. You can check out more of his photography here.

Check out the Last.fm page

Brian Sopher on Soundcloud

Tyler Thompson on Soundcloud

Click here to download

On Repeat: Orphan School - Secret Admirer, Burial - Kindred EP, Mustapha Mond - Keeping Secrets, Ben Frost - Discography

Choice Cinema: Wim Wenders 'Wings of Desire',  Jim Jarmusch 'Stranger Than Paradise'

Circuit Bent Toy Keyboard

As I mentioned in my last post, I have recently taken an interest in circuit bending and experimenting with sound in general so I thought I would share my first foray into it. The toy used in the video is a cheap toy keyboard that I picked up from a goodwill for about 4 dollars. The video exists to document some interesting sounds that I was able to achieve as I was exploring the toy's circuits. I wired the bends to a potentiometer and two switches which can be seen (and heard) manipulating the sound.

Initially, I wanted to attach an output for use with an amplifier and ultimately repackage the toy into an instrument of it's own but unfortunately, shortly after the video was made the toy died which is somewhat disappointing but oh well. Expect more.

On Repeat: Kilgore Trout - Split with False Flag

Other Blogs / Sites of Interest: seeyouinsleep / BrianWilliamGreen (beautiful sounds)

Layers Revisited

So, lately I've been swamped with school projects this quarter which hasn't given me a lot of time to work on anything I actually want to work on.  With that being said, instead of posting anything new pertaining to this project I have decided this post will be dedicated to revisiting a self portrait project that I worked on during my senior year of high school for my portfolio class.

Instead of simply posting pictures with a description for each I decided to do something a bit different.  I've noticed a few artists who have posted images or made downloadable PDF's of their portfolios for clients or admirers to view.  These are really great because it gives other creative people a chance to learn about the creative process they went through in order to achieve the end result.  Inspired by this I decided to make a portfolio of my own with steps describing the process I went through so that anyone else willing to experiment would be able to do something similar by applying the technique I used to their own art. 

Apart

Together

Final Image

After finishing this project a friend my father works with saw it and sent me a link concerning two other artists, David Spriggs and Xia Xiaowan. Both of which have a series dedicated to paintings on glass.  However, their paintings as oppose to mine are much more life-like and expressive in technique and aesthetic than my the art that I've chosen to display in this post.  Their art made me really want to work harder and expand my skills.  Its pretty mind blowing and visually stunning, check it out.

Let me know whats up. Constructive criticisms and questions are always welcome.

-Stay Tuned